


Project Superboy

by zarabithia



Category: DCU (Comics)
Genre: M/M, alternate universe: mutants
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-02
Updated: 2019-09-02
Packaged: 2020-10-05 07:55:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 589
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20485472
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zarabithia/pseuds/zarabithia
Summary: Tim gets a little attached to his scientific experiment.





	Project Superboy

Working at the mutant experiments division of Lex Corps, even as an intern, was a definite step up from being a lowly mail room clerk at Wayne Enterprises, and Tim was grateful enough for the promotion that the potential ethical quandaries were only briefly considered before being summarily dismissed as unimportant. He had the mind of a scientist, not a clerk, and if Bruce Wayne's company couldn't recognize or reward his efforts, Tim Drake was more than willing to begin his career with Lex Luthor's company instead.

So it became that a man who had never seriously been concerned with the "mutant menace" found himself nodding appropriately at anti-mutant commentary made by his bosses and peers. Despite Tim's day to day apathy over "the issue," he found himself working overtime hours at press junkets and political rallies when the owner of his company ran for election against mutant advocate Oliver Queen.

Tim's efforts were rewarded with another promotion, and Tim's anti-mutant propaganda speech grew more frequent as the nature of the game became apparent. The benefits kept his wife and daughter happy, and Tim would do anything to keep the smiles on Stephanie and Carrie's faces.

The rules of the game changed one morning in August, when Tim was promoted to senior research analyst at Lex Corps' West Coast devision.

On that day, Tim was given the keys to the cage holding Project Superboy, Lex Corps' longest running mutant experiment. His DNA had been taken from the so-called Superman, the world's most infamous mutant, and had been altered and combined with human DNA in an experiment whose original purpose had been to show the world how dangerous miscegenation could be. Full disclosure had since been disregarded as a possibility; in the wake of the Coast City tragedy it seemed political suicide. For the president to reveal his company had been playing with the DNA of the man who had obliterated an entire city would have been foolish.

Thus, Superboy sat in his cage, submitted to test after test. Too many of them, in Tim's estimate, were pointless and didn't tell any of them what they actually needed to know about mutants.

Tim's scientific curiosity was piqued, and from day one, he made efforts to communicate with the specimen. Much to his surprise, Superboy communicated back.

The specimen communicated well enough that Tim was able to learn valuable information - publishable only to his bosses, of course - concerning mutant interpersonal skills, including argument skills, leisure activities, and food and drink habits.

Eventually, he was even able to give a detailed description of mutant mating habits.

It was the last report that concerned his bosses, though Tim did his best to explain the scientific importance of such knowledge. Certainly, Superboy's participation in the study (or, more appropriately, studies) was consensual, but that did not, in Tim's view, negate the sheer magnitude of the scientific break through.

His bosses disagreed, and Tim was reassigned to another division, one without a living specimen.

Tim accepted the demotion calmly, for the sake of Stephanie and Carrie. But before he left, the code to Superboy's cell was spelled out on the inside of Superboy's cheek with Tim's tongue.

From his Gotham office, Tim looked across the street into the waiting room of Lucius Fox's office as he listened to reports of a loose "Superboy" recently spotted over Hawaii. Tim smiled briefly at the unimaginative press before going back to work.

He had a press rally to attend tonight, and reports to finish before he could attend.


End file.
